A number of cooled catheter systems have been developed for treating tissue in a cardiac setting, either to cool the tissue sufficiently to stun it and allow cold mapping of the heart and/or confirmation of catheter position with respect to localized tissue lesions, or to apply a more severe level of cold to ablate tissue at the site of the catheter ending. In general, the range of treatments which may be effected by a cryocatheter is comparable to the range of applications for radio frequency or thermal ablation catheters, and in particular, these instruments may be configured to achieve either small localized ball shape lesions at the tip of the catheter, or one or more elongated linear lesions extending a length of several centimeters or more along the tip. The latter form of lesion is commonly used to achieve conduction block across a region of the cardiac wall so as to sever an aberrant pathway over a length preventing conduction across the region, in order change the cardiac signal path topology, for example, to eliminate a faulty pathway responsible for atrial fibrillation or a tachycardia.
In general, when used for endovascular access to treat the cardiac wall, catheters of this type, in common with the corresponding earlier-developed radio frequency or electrothermal ablation catheter, must meet fairly demanding limitations regarding their size, flexibility, and the factors of strength, electrical conductivity and the like which affect their safety and may give rise to failure modes in use. These constraints generally require that the catheter be no larger than several millimeters in diameter so as to pass through the vascular system of the patient to the heart. Thus, any electrodes (in the case of mapping or RF/electrothermal ablation catheters), and any coolant passages (in the case of cryocatheters) must fit within a catheter body of small size.
A number of different fluids have been used for the coolant component of prior art cryotreatment catheters, such as a concentrated saline solution or other liquid of suitably low freezing point and viscosity, and of suitably high thermal conductivity and heat capacity, or a liquified gas such as liquid nitrogen. In all such constructions, the coolant must circulate through the catheter, thus necessitating multiple passages leading to the cooling area of the tip from the catheter handle.
Furthermore, conditions of patient safety must be considered, raising numerous problems or design constraints for each particular system. Thus for example, a high pressure may be required to circulate sufficient coolant through the catheter body to its tip and back, and the overall design of a catheter must be such that fracture of the catheter wall or leakage of the coolant either does not occur, or if it occurs, is harmless. Further, for an endovascular catheter construction, the presence of the coolant and circulation system should not substantially impair the flexibility or maneuverability of the catheter tip and body.
To some extent these considerations have been addressed by using a phase change material as the cryogenic fluid, and arranging the catheter such that the phase change, e.g., from a liquid to a gas, occurs in the treatment portion of the catheter tip. Another possible approach is to employ a pressurized gas, and configure the catheter for cooling by expansion of the gas in the tip structure. However, owing to the small size that such a catheter is required to assume for vascular insertion, or the awkwardness of handling a cryogenic treatment probe generally, the design of a safe and effective coolant circulation system which nonetheless dependably provides sufficient cooling capacity at a remote tip remains a difficult goal.
Among other common problems to be addressed while providing adequate thermal capacity, may be noted the leakage problem mentioned above, the problem of effectively preventing the catheter as a whole from being excessively cold or damaging tissue away from the intended site, and the problem of conduit or valve blockage owing for example to ice particles and the like.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a coolant system which conveniently attaches to a cryocatheter.
It would also be desirable to provide a coolant system which injects and retrieves the coolant from the catheter to allow continuous operation without leakage into the environment or other loss of coolant.
It would further be desirable to provide a treatment system which precisely controls ablation and treatment regimens by conditioning the coolant supply at various point along the fluid path.